Wood River times. [volume] (Hailey, Idaho) 1882-1915, 1887-06-01
CATTLE FEEDING.
A NEW PHASE OF A GREAT WEST
ERN INDUSTRY.
How Porterhouse Steaks Are Made for
the Eastern Epicure-A Rapid TRANSIT
tion from Ten Cent Corn to Luscious
Rib Roasts.


Especial COfTeSpOuucHCc.l
...... FREMONT, Neb., May 81.
A new industry has sprung up in this state
within the last year and half, of which peo-
pie east of us know very little. 1t was not
dreamed of twenty five years ago, when all
our beef came from Texas up over the Kan
sas trail, much less thirty years ago, when
the Pathfinder surveyed this beautiful little
city of Fremont. In those days grass fed
Texas steer weighing TOO pounds in meat and
200 in horns, tail and hoofs, was about as
good beef as the market knew, and during
the war the prices were something fabulous
even for such poor critters. The cowboys
who drove stock up north did It at peril of con-
fiscaton by the military authorities and ran
great risks to earn their 100 per cent profit.
Nowadays the whole cattle business has be-
come civilized and is about as tame as the
dry goods, business. The ranches are fenced
in, the Indians have been killed off or stock
AIDED in Florida, the war is over and the big
operators have got the whole business down
so fine that the handsome profits in the olden
time have all disappeared. Yet to those who
have gone into the new feature of the cattle
business there have been very good returns.
This new feature is stall feeding and there is
no place where it is so successful or carried
on quite so extensively as in "Newbraskey."
1t was discovered in the close margin of
profit few years ago that it would pay to
take ranch fed cattle and fatten them on corn.
A few far seeing operators went into the
business on a small scale in Iowa and Mis-
souri, ten years ago. They made money, but
somehow nobody ever attempted the thing
on large scale until a few enterprising
ranch men in this state saw their chance
The facts which gradually demonstrated the
ntNnn INIT tI,a
crop and the discrimination at the Chicao,
stock yards against grass fed animals. H.
1879 Nebraska was hardly thought Of in Ia,
list of corn states. In 1854 she raised 49,,
1000 bushels and in 1885 130,OO0OOO Thi,
showed that there was enough corn west of
the Missouri river to fatten cattle from the
ranges of Utah, Montana, Colorado and
wyoming. lowa's corn yield had fallen off
ana prices there went up in local markets.
while in Nebraska they went down. l am
told by the manager of one of the largest
ieedlnS barns near Fremont that his com
pany raid last season but eight cents bushel
FOR corn raised on its own ranch, and the
highest paid for that bought of neichborinp
farmers was thirteen cents. A bushel of
corn will put ten pounds of meat Oh a steer
which will bring three and four cents
pound. The profit in the business rolls M
when by feeding a steer four months from
100 to 400 pounds of flesh are put on him.
There are dozen big concerns in the ranch
feed business. One company fed last winter
lo,ooO head, another company at North Bend
fed 5000 head, another $500; this company
also had oTcr TO- 600 head in their barns near
Omaha. These numbers, of course, vary
somewhat, but they are approximate and if
anything are less rather than more than the
actual size of the herds fed.